Flipped Professional Development
The Future of Flipped PD
Diverse Accomplishments
Kristin Daniels and I knew from the onset that we wanted to establish a system that honored teachers’ different experience levels, relationships with technologies, interest areas, and grade levels. We also wanted to encourage choices that were practical, meaningful, and innovative. We wanted to empower teachers with information and resources that promote momentum with their individual professional development.
Our method for promoting a customized professional development system was borrowed from the flipped classroom model. In a mature form of Flipped PD, instead of going to a professional development session to receive content, the content is accessed prior to coming to a professional development session. In the session itself, teachers use the new informational content to create a product, project, plan, or activity. The technology integration specialist serves as a professional learning coach, helping the teacher apply the information content specifically to a project or activity of their own design.
There are seemingly an infinite number of ways to select and share information about technology relevant to education. No single way is appropriate for everyone because all teachers have their own interests, levels of experience, grade levels and content areas. Nevertheless, we have organized the possible choices into four strand areas: communication, collaboration, creative media, and presentation.
We created an initial set of instructional movies prior to the implementation of the Flipped PD project. We knew in advance that this set of instructional movies was merely a starting point. We knew that a need would arise for additional movies, and our client teachers would guide us to knowing what instructional movies are needed. As our sessions progressed through the first four months of this project, we discovered a great deal about the kinds of instructional movies that need to be created for the current set of teachers and future sets of teachers.
The basic architecture we implemented used a series of rotating substitute teachers (usually funded through building staff development budgets) to enable classroom teachers to meet with a technology integration specialist in a two hour block of time once each month. This architecture had several variations. At Afton Lakeland elementary and Lily Lake elementary, Flipped PD was offered to all of the classroom teachers six months out of the calendar year. At Lake Elmo elementary all classroom teachers participated four months out of the calendar year either in semester one or in semester two. At Marine elementary, Withrow elementary, Andersen elementary, and Rutherford elementary, teachers participated on a voluntary basis using this model. They will experience between 4 to 6 months of Flipped PD during the calendar year. At the remaining two elementary schools, the resources were available to all, but the face-to-face time was negotiated on an individual basis.
The types of accomplishments that emerged in the first few months of the Flipped PD project include creation of classroom websites, learning about email group lists, using Google docs to create collaborative documents between teachers and students, creating flipcharts for classroom presentations, and creating a variety of individual classroom projects such as:
As we continue with the current Flipped PD model through the rest of this year, we will continue to create instructional movies, coach small groups of teachers, and pursue practical ways to support teachers who implement innovative projects in their classrooms. Flipped PD was shared with others at the TIES conference and the MASSP conference. In June, Flipped PD will be presented at the ISTE conference.
An Alternative Paradigm
The current model for Flipped PD has been wildly popular with the teachers who have participated. Many of the teachers who originally only were signed up for semester one requested the opportunity to sign up for semester two as well. The combination of instructional movies and personalized coaching from technology integration specialists has been highly effective for increasing the confidence level of teachers with learning and applying new technologies in a meaningful way in classroom environments.
The funding for the current model has come from staff development money appropriated for individual buildings. With the prospect of substantial cuts ahead of us in our school district to compensate for a failed levy referendum and a $10 million financial shortfall, the source of our current funding may be in jeopardy in the future. If staff development money becomes a casualty of the district’s budget reductions, new ways will need to be implemented to sustain the momentum for Flipped PD .
One such method is a model currently under consideration called Elementary Technology Cohorts (ETC). This model uses all of the principles of Flipped PD but applies them in a way which does not rely on staff development dollars to sustain it. With this model, small cohorts are set up and coached by a technology integration specialist. These cohorts consist of three teachers or three teacher teams from three separate school buildings. The cohorts would be assembled by grade level, technology experience, and interest areas.
As an extension of Flipped PD, Elementary Technology Cohorts have several purposes. These small cohorts would explore new options for innovative classroom practices, explore collaborative design methods, create new resources, and share resources. The first meeting would be a direct face-to-face meeting with the cohort members plus a technology integration specialist. Successive meetings would be conducted through synchronous communication using iChat or Skype. Using an agreed-upon schedule, teleconferencing would be used to exchange information, ideas, and resources. A final meeting would again be face-to-face and would focus on summarizing and evaluating the experience.
The Elementary Technology Cohorts would build upon the strengths of Flipped PD using a methodology that has a collaborative focus. The four strands (communication, collaboration, creative media, and presentation) would again be used to organize the possibilities for content delivery. Selection of content areas for technology integration such as language arts, science, or social studies would be negotiated between the participants. Project design would capitalize on accumulated information through collaboration, although either individual projects or a collective project could emerge. Instructional videos, staples of Flipped PD, would also be integral components of the Elementary Technology Cohorts. Physical resources such as recording equipment or mobile devices may need to be obtained.
A collaborative journal will be assembled by the Elementary Technology Cohorts. This journal will include observations, strategies, and questions. Ultimately, this journal will be shared with others through a website, ebook, or other means. In addition, final products that are produced as a result of a collaborative work (websites, movies, ebooks, etc.) will also be shared.
We will establish three pilot cohorts for the Elementary Technology Cohorts project. One of these cohorts will be three music teachers from three different elementary schools working together to produce collaborative musical compositions using harmonies, melodies, rhythms and loops composed by students in grades K - 6. Another cohort will be a group of sixth grade teachers from three different elementary schools that will produce a blended course using Moodle. A third cohort will be teachers from three different elementary schools whose grade level focus is yet to be determined.
The technology integration specialists will be present with the initial meetings of these cohorts to guide them through the technical and pedagogical processes. As the cohorts gain confidence with the processes, the need for the regular presence of a technology integration specialist may become less important.
There are advantages to this alternative paradigm. At its root, it taps into the strengths of Flipped PD. Teachers have access to instructional videos and receive guidance and coaching from technology integration specialists. Teleconferencing tools liberate teachers from the constraints of building environments without adding the stresses of time and travel. There is a substantial reduction in costs. The collaborative nature of the process and products offer possibilities for cascading influences in the future for others.
Day 99: The Future of Flipped Math Classroom
Day 100: Recap and Reflections